Nitrates vs no nitrates.

[Jonathan lee]

So i just stumbled upon a video on youtube about why nitrates and phosphates are good for the corals in your tank and it made me realise it could be true. My tank had high nitrates like really high above 80. My corals were doing not so well in that range so i started doing alot of water changes to get it down. When i was at 30ppm nitrate my corals were opening up again and looking all good so i went to the lfs and saw they had a deal on some orange btas. I really wanted one but i had nitrates at 30ppm still so i thought nah i should wait. But the owner of the lfs told me that nitrates are needed to keep stuff healthy too so having it too low or undetected isnt that good and that if i get the nem now i will be fine. So i did. It was doing surprisingly well for 6 weeks. But then as i did my weekly water changes, my nitrates dropped to 0.2 and i noticed that the corals especially the lps weren’t opening up as big as usual and my anemone has started to lose size and some colour.


So now im just wondering if anyone has had this happen to them. Corals and anemone doing good with nitrates 20-30 but doing bad at 0-5ppm nitrates. My tank has been at 0.2ppm for a month now and my corals and anemone aren’t looking as good as they used too compared to when i had some nitrates.

Thoughts on this?

 

[ihavecrabs]

I run my tank at 20ppm nitrates and no complaints from my corals so far.

 

[Jonathan lee]

I run my tank at 20ppm nitrates and no complaints from my corals so far.

Yea i was having better colour and coral expansion with higher nitrates compared to none.....

 

[saltyhog]

I don't know that it needs to be high, but it sure doesn't need to be zero. My colors have always have been better with some nitrate.

 

[miPapareef]

What is your phosphate level? I've seen research suggesting it is more of an issue than low nitrate. Also just the swings of nutrient levels is enough to impact coral health. It's best to stay steady, even if levels are a little higher or lower than target range.

 

[mattzang]

I stumbled upon that recently, which made me feel better about my nitrates in the 50 range..

but for my 7ish month old tank, it's probably not advisable to try to be in that range. still aiming for lowerish, but not feeling the need for a ULN system

 

[Jonathan lee]

What is your phosphate level? I've seen research suggesting it is more of an issue than low nitrate. Also just the swings of nutrient levels is enough to impact coral health. It's best to stay steady, even if levels are a little higher or lower than target range.

Phosphate at 0.03 or less cant really tell

 

[Jonathan lee]

I stumbled upon that recently, which made me feel better about my nitrates in the 50 range..

but for my 7ish month old tank, it's probably not advisable to try to be in that range. still aiming for lowerish, but not feeling the need for a ULN system

I had better luck with nitrates 20-30 so i guess im gonna try to get in that range again to see if theres any improvement

 

[Jonathan lee]

Also, why is it that with nitrates almost undetectable and phosphate at 0.03. Im still having hair algae problems? Its still growing even after im manually removing it from the rock. Is it too much light?

 

[Jonathan lee]

What is your phosphate level? I've seen research suggesting it is more of an issue than low nitrate. Also just the swings of nutrient levels is enough to impact coral health. It's best to stay steady, even if levels are a little higher or lower than target range.

Oh yea im also running phosguard

 

[jzw]

absolutely necessary, ppm level depends what ur keepin.

 

[Jonathan lee]

absolutely necessary, ppm level depends what ur keepin.

Currently softies like mushrooms, zoas, some lps and bta. What should my nutrient levels be?

 

[jzw]

i think most people are hesistant to recommend levels lol

my impression is richard ross's is tank is quite old, diverse, and established, and his po4 levels are not typical of most reefer's tanks. i remember my brother saying holy ****! during his video.

in our system, everything almost died when we were at zero no3 and po4. now our lps get angry with no3 below 1.0 ppm, and happier now we're at around 2ppm.

this is brs's summary, and kudos to ryan for having the balls to set out hard #s. i wish this was out when we set up our tank last year, lol. but they might be doing an sps dominant tank - watch their video below.

 

[Jonathan lee]

i think most people are hesistant to recommend levels lol

my impression is richard ross's is tank is quite old, diverse, and established, and his po4 levels are not typical of most reefer's tanks.

in our system, our lps get angry with no3 below 1.0 ppm, and happier now we're at around 2ppm.

this is brs's summary, and kudos to ryan for having the balls to set out hard #s. but they might be doing an sps dominant tank. watch their video below.

Ooo thanks

 

[Big E]

I don't know of anyone that started out with frags(especially Acropora dominant systems) in that very high range of nutrient levels and had long term success.

I see a lot of successful tanks that are in the ballpark range I recommend which is similar to the BRS range---

P04- .02-.10
No3- .25- 10.0ppm

Most of the time the ratio is approx. 100-1, but lower at 50-1 or higher 200-1 can work.

One thing to keep in mind is your input of food at the lower end of the scale.............for example at P04- .02 and N03- .25 you have to make sure you heavily feed the fish. What's important is throughput of nutrients more so than the actual numbers you test.

You may need to target feed some LPS and nems at that low level as well.........they have big mouths for a reason.

For every tank that is like R. Ross there are 100+ successful tanks in the range I mention above.

This Nem( 5 years) and acans are in .07 and 5-7.0ppm

 

[PatW]

I have mainly SPS corals. I run my tank at .5 to 5 ppm nitrate and I try to keep at .75 - 2 ppm. If I get to 0, the corals can really suffer. If I get to above 15 ppm, the corals suffer.

For phosphates, I keep above 0. Generally, I run between .015 and .04 ppm. Being a little high does not seem to be a problem.

I have a refugium with Cheeto for nutrient export.

Typically, I have to dose nitrate and phosphates to maintain the levels. I dose sodium nitrate and trisodium phosphate. I get the chemicals from Amazon and buy an economical reagent grade which is 99.5% pure.

Now I have SPS which like a “ lean” nutrient environment. For other corals, going higher on nitrates would probably be good.

 

[Jonathan lee]

I have mainly SPS corals. I run my tank at .5 to 5 ppm nitrate and I try to keep at .75 - 2 ppm. If I get to 0, the corals can really suffer. If I get to above 15 ppm, the corals suffer.

For phosphates, I keep above 0. Generally, I run between .015 and .04 ppm. Being a little high does not seem to be a problem.

I have a refugium with Cheeto for nutrient export.

Typically, I have to dose nitrate and phosphates to maintain the levels. I dose sodium nitrate and trisodium phosphate. I get the chemicals from Amazon and buy an economical reagent grade which is 99.5% pure.

Now I have SPS which like a “ lean” nutrient environment. For other corals, going higher on nitrates would probably be good.

I just removed my denitrate and did a water change hoping my nitrates will slowly build back up and hope i can keep it around 5-10

 

[jtl]

As most agree there is no one good answer. This seems to be more of a conversation in the last few years, unless I was just not seeing it 10 years ago. Anyway BRS uses something they call a modified Redfield Ratio at 10:1 but there are are some gorgeous tanks at close to 100:1. I only started looking at P and N when I thought my corals were starting to look a little pale. I bumped my numbers up and started to get gha so I have since reduced them to PO4 .037 and NO3 0.6 and it would be fine if they were even a little lower. I have very little growth of chaeto in my refugium, not dying, but certainly not growing. After seeing all of the nice tanks at nutrient levels that are all over the board I am just going to stay about where I am. I only have 4 small fish, so I feed modestly and occasionally I feed the corals. I just want stability.

 

[Tamberav]

So i just stumbled upon a video on youtube about why nitrates and phosphates are good for the corals in your tank and it made me realise it could be true. My tank had high nitrates like really high above 80. My corals were doing not so well in that range so i started doing alot of water changes to get it down. When i was at 30ppm nitrate my corals were opening up again and looking all good so i went to the lfs and saw they had a deal on some orange btas. I really wanted one but i had nitrates at 30ppm still so i thought nah i should wait. But the owner of the lfs told me that nitrates are needed to keep stuff healthy too so having it too low or undetected isnt that good and that if i get the nem now i will be fine. So i did. It was doing surprisingly well for 6 weeks. But then as i did my weekly water changes, my nitrates dropped to 0.2 and i noticed that the corals especially the lps weren’t opening up as big as usual and my anemone has started to lose size and some colour.


So now im just wondering if anyone has had this happen to them. Corals and anemone doing good with nitrates 20-30 but doing bad at 0-5ppm nitrates. My tank has been at 0.2ppm for a month now and my corals and anemone aren’t looking as good as they used too compared to when i had some nitrates.

Thoughts on this?

My Nitrates are 2 and my PO4 is 0.02-0.03. I do not have any issue with my BTA or SPS. However if your tank was used to being at 30ppm and you dropped it rapidly, that could cause problems. STABILITY STABILITY STABILITY. I would have brought it down slowly to 5-10 over a series of water changes/weeks even and then kept it there.

 

[Bob Lauson]

In the battle with dinos I followed the suggestions and got my phosphates up to around 0.10 ppm and I have kept them there by dosing Neophos. I don’t do anything to control nitrates but they are only running around 1 ppm. I feed generously and don’t have anything on the sump. My corals are doing awesome.